


The Enigmatic Diaries

by stardust_made



Series: The Christmas Series [2]
Category: Sherlock (TV)
Genre: Canon Related, Christmas, Friendship, Gen, Pre-Slash
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-12-20
Updated: 2011-12-20
Packaged: 2017-10-27 15:02:14
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,194
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/297107
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/stardust_made/pseuds/stardust_made
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Prompt: "I'd love to see Sherlock freaking out about trying to get the perfect Christmas gift for John. Bonus points if John's already worked out the perfect gift for Sherlock." Here, I focused on the latter.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Enigmatic Diaries

Computers had never been John’s forte. He liked the quickness of the internet and by this point he could type all right, what with having so much practice over the last couple of years. He liked blogging more and more but he still didn’t enjoy it as much as he had enjoyed writing the old-fashioned way.

John had no illusions about the artistry of _what_ he wrote. If anything, he was a story-teller at heart, not a poet. Back in Afghanistan he used to catch himself narrating in his head: little humdrum situations from the day or major events for the entire country. Anything in-between, too—the spectacular variety of humanity, in its glory and its ugliness. He would lie on his back with his hands tucked under his head, staring at the ceiling or the bright desert sky, and sometimes the words would just arrange themselves somewhere in that ordinary skull of his, like letters on a Scrabble board.

Occasionally John wished he had a diary—a plain piece of stationery, where he could write down his narrations. The idea had occurred to him again recently. Sherlock’s last three cases hadn’t been appropriate for public consumption, but John still wanted to write them, even if it meant using a pen and paper and then locking the stories away. When it came to the cases writing was more than a hobby and more than an itch. It was intrinsic to John’s whole life with Sherlock, John’s private way of singing a modern day ode to the greatest man he’d had the privilege to know and follow.

So the thrill he felt when he came across the diaries didn’t come from surprise; on the contrary, it was almost as if he’d had an eerie premonition about them.

He found them at one of those antique fairs. He’d gone with Mrs. Hudson in the capacity of her slightly reluctant advisor. She wanted to buy some military paraphernalia for her nephew who was a collector, and since John was the only person in her acquaintance who’d brushed with military life, she asked for his help. John always found it hard to say no when women asked things of him, especially when they asked nicely, so he went.

The diaries attracted him with—Well, actually, that was part of the spookiness. He couldn’t tell with what they attracted him. He was browsing the tables, stopping here and there to look at objects absent-mindedly, mostly just waiting for Mrs. Hudson’s _woo-hoo_ to beckon him to service. (She’d been very kind and told him that she only wanted his attention for the particular job at hand, and John was left to his own devices under the agreement that as soon as Mrs. Hudson spotted something she’d call him.)

The diaries were in a box with some other old books and magazines. Perhaps John’s eye was drawn by their large number—there were at least a dozen—and by the neat arrangement of their dark worn leather spines nestled next to each other. But he found his hand extend to pick up one and open it gingerly. The man behind the table was talking to a woman about a tea pot so John couldn’t ask him how old the diaries were, but it was obvious they were quite old, so his touch was careful. His heart hushed when he saw the pages filled with handwriting. John didn’t know _what_ else he possibly expected, but he had a powerful sense that he was entering someone’s very real and very personal world.

It took him a moment to put together some pieces and form an idea about what he was holding in his hands. John noticed that there were lines and paragraphs on some pages and others contained just scattered notes. He spotted the original owner’s name in the third diary he picked up randomly. Doctor Arthur Conan Doyle. Another pleasant flutter of the heart at the discovery that these had likely belonged to a colleague. Then, as he was turning some pages, John saw a title on top of one: _The Greek Interpreter_.

It dawned at him that the clearly defined paragraphs were in fact parts of stories. Were these diaries someone’s writing notebooks? Maybe the author had been published? Maybe he’d even been well-known in his time, and John had found a treasure!

The man behind the table nodded his goodbyes to the tea pot lady—who carried her treasure away happily—and turned to John. He had a wide, friendly face with a hint of high blood pressure about it, and he wore side-whiskers that John had seen on some portraits from his grandfather’s youth. His expression was inviting enough for John to start the conversation without preamble.

“Could you—I was just wondering: How old are these? Do you know anything about them?”

The man’s face had livened up half-way through John’s questions and he was already nodding.

“Ah! Good, good! Yes, sir, these are—As a matter of fact those are from my wife’s side of the family. _They_ are the interesting types, what!” He flashed a big toothed, yellowing smile. “Funny story, very peculiar. These belonged to a great-uncle of my wife’s. He wrote some of these as a sort of memoir, like they used to do back in the day. He tried to publish them, I think, but probably no one would have them. The family legend is that he never married because of those—half his life writing he was!” The man was bouncing back and forth on his heels, clearly enjoying his own spot of story-telling. “He wrote real stories, mind, not some hokum. These are at least a hundred years old, ha!”

John nearly jumped at the hearty exclamation accompanying the change of topic.

“It’s the references, you see,” the man continued, then interrupted himself. “Not that I’ve been able to read more than the dates and some words, what!”

He beamed benevolently at John and reached for the notebook in John’s hand. “Here, let me show you,” he said, opening to a page somewhere in the middle, then squinting at it. “Can you make any sense of it?” he asked, turning the notebook to John. His slightly chipped nail—together with the small scratches on the hardened skin it betrayed a keen gardener—pointed at a long sentence.

John brought his head closer and read out loud: “I walked down the narrow passage between the double row of sleepers, holding my breath to keep out the vile, stupefying fumes of the drug, and looking about for the manager.”

John lifted his eyes to the man, expecting an explanation about what was special in the sentence and met a pair of gleaming eyes probing all over his face.

“Well done to you, sir,” the man said and gave John a quick bow of the head. “Very few people have been able to read the handwriting. It’s all squiggles to me and Daphne—that’s my lovely wife. She slipped on the front steps, iced they were. She slipped the other day and fell, sprained her ankle, poor petal…What was I sa—Oh yes. Daphne says no one in her family was able to make heads or tails of these, but her grandfather, who told her about his—”

“Woo-hoo!”

John turned automatically and saw Mrs. Hudson two rows back, towards the very end of the line of tables, waving a hand at him. John made an indefinite gesture with his own hand, aiming to indicate _I’ll be right with you_. Scratching his forehead he looked at the man.

“I’m sorry, I’ll just have to—Erm. What did you say were—Did your wife’s grandfather read these?”

The man nodded vigorously. “Oh yes, he did, sir. This was the peculiar part. He was so taken with the stories he made enquiries about his uncle Arthur and found out what I told you.” There was a pause before the dramatic delivery of the punch line. “Apparently these are all like detective stories.” The finish was modestly triumphant.

John’s eyebrows rose. “What? Like crime fiction?”

“That’s right, sir, that’s right!” The man’s eyebrows completely defeated John’s at expressiveness. He patted the bulk of notebooks. “All written by my wife’s great-uncle and all about this man he knew, Doctor Joseph Bell, who was—Well, I suppose you can call him a private detective, what!”

John could feel himself tingling all over. He looked at Mrs. Hudson, then at his watch and pursed his mouth. A hundred years old. Heaven knew how much these would cost. What if John couldn’t read them all? What if they were dull?

What if _he_ threw them aside, disdainful, after only reading the first story?

John licked his lips quickly and cast yet another look at Mrs. Hudson, catching her eye. His body swayed in her direction, then he lifted a hand with one finger up, hoping she was able to read his apology and his request for another minute. He turned to the man.

“How much do they cost?” he asked.

“There are fifteen more in the box underneath, my good man, I must warn you, I must!” The man’s tone was cheerful but John didn’t think this was the joy of a tradesman.

“How many books altogether?” John said, before grimacing. “Listen, do you mind if I just pop over—”

“What is that you have here, John?” Mrs. Hudson’s voice gave John a start. He turned to his right to find her next to him, peering down at the table with a bright expression.

“I’m so sorry, Mrs. Hudson,” he said. “I just saw something—I think I might have found a present for Sherlock.”

“Oh, dear! You should have said so! Let’s have a look then.” Mrs. Hudson’s fingers were already dancing over the cover of the book lying closed on the table. “Oh, I need my reading glasses,” she said and started to rummage through her bag, muttering to herself, “The mess in here…I only had them in my hand now.” She gave up and looked at him. “What are these, John?”

“I was just telling the young man that these are the detective stories my wife’s great grand-uncle wrote,” the man said, brushing the books again warmly.

“How interesting!” Mrs. Hudson enthused. “Murders then. Are they any good?”

John was just about to shrug, uncertain, when he realized he wasn’t the one supposed to answer the question. He was feeling oddly proprietary about these diaries. Meanwhile their owner-by-spouse’s-side was explaining to Mrs. Hudson the trouble with the unintelligible writing. John picked another book and opened it at random.

 _“She wore an expression such as I had never seen before—such as I should have thought her incapable of assuming. She was deadly pale and breathing fast, glancing furtively towards the bed as she fastened her mantle, to see if she had disturbed me. Then, thinking that I was still asleep, she slipped noiselessly from the room, and an instant later I heard a sharp creaking which could only come from the hinges of the front door. I sat up in bed and rapped my knuckles against the rail to make certain that I was truly awake. Then I took my watch from under the pillow. It was three in the morning. What on this earth could my wife be doing out on the country road at three in the morning?”_

Perfectly clear. Moreover, perfectly involving, too. John flipped through the book, hand more assured. This Doctor Bell seemed to be the main character, indeed—John’s eyes caught his name a few times. And the author’s name was there as well, probably as he was being addressed by Doctor Bell.

Arthur Conan Doyle. What an unusual name; quite like a literary character’s name itself. John wondered if Doctor Conan Doyle _had_ known Doctor Bell, if they’d worked together…what they had been to each other.

He came to a decision.

“How much?” he said firmly. “Sorry,” he added, realizing he’d interrupted Mrs Hudson, who was showing the man a small crocheted piece she’d taken out of her bag. The man was looking slightly bewildered but engaged.

He turned to John and something in John’s face clipped whatever little speech he was prepared to give.

“Twenty-five diaries altogether, ten pounds-a-piece,” he said.

Two-hundred and fifty pounds.

“Two-hundred and fifty pounds,” John said out loud.

“Yes, sir.” The man nodded.

Two-hundred and fifty pounds. Blimey.

It was worth it. If it was going to keep Sherlock entertained even for a day, it was better than anything else John could get him. And if Sherlock struggled with the handwriting, then John was just going to have to read all the diaries aloud to him.

There _were_ the long winter evenings between the cases after all.

~~~  
For a visual of the mix between the Sherlock Holmes verses, have a look at [this marvellous, funny comic](http://elina-elsu.livejournal.com/566190.html) by [](http://elina-elsu.livejournal.com/profile)[**elina_elsu**](http://elina-elsu.livejournal.com/).

First quote from “The Man with the Twisted Lip” (“The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes” by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle) Second quote from “The Yellow Face” (“The Memoirs of Sherlock Holmes” by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)   


**Author's Note:**

> Beta by the fantastic [](http://disastrolabe.livejournal.com/profile)[**disastrolabe**](http://disastrolabe.livejournal.com/). Written for [](http://fuyu-no-fuhei.livejournal.com/profile)[**fuyu_no_fuhei**](http://fuyu-no-fuhei.livejournal.com/). Original entry [over here](http://stardust-made.livejournal.com/41277.html) at my Livejournal.


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